Culture and Identity as Politically Inevitable Concepts: A prelude to adjusting the anthropological debate on multiculturalism to political reality

Pored pregleda opštih problema sa kojima se savremena politička, pravna i kulturna teorija suočavaju kada je u pitanju multikulturalizam, u ovom radu ću staviti naglasak na ključne segmente antropološke kritike i odnosa prema ovoj filozofskoj i političkoj ideji (i praksi). U tom smislu polazim od pretpostavke da je redefinisanje koncepata ‘kulture’ i ‘identiteta’ u antropologiji, posebno od druge polovine XX veka na ovamo, u samoj disciplini otvorilo nova, politički relevantna pitanja, što antropolozima pruža šansu da učestvuju u koordinisanju svojih teorijskih koncepata u aktuelnim političkim upotrebama i da doprinesu savremenoj političkoj teoriji – pa tako i multikulturalnim debatama. Poseban naglasak u tekstu stavljen je na ambivalentnost koju savremena antropološka teorija (post-)kulture oseća prema zloupotrebama kulturnih posebnosti i strateškoj politici identiteta.Apart from an overview of general problems faced by contemporary political, legal and cultural theories regarding multiculturalism, I will place emphasis in this work on the key segments of anthropological critique and relation towards multiculturalism as a philosophical and political idea (and practise). In this sense I will start from the assumption that redefinition of the concepts of ‘culture’ and ‘identity’ in anthropology has, especially since the second half of the 20th century, posed some new, politically relevant questions within the discipline itself, thus providing anthropologists a chance to participate in coordination of their theoretical concepts in current political uses, and contribute to contemporary political theory – including multicultural debates. Particular emphasis is put in this text on the ambivalence felt by the contemporary anthropological theory of (post-)culture towards misuses of cultural peculiarities and strategic identity politics